Since I wrote this, Trump had himself photographed "working": signing a blank piece of paper, with a binder photoshopped in afterwards to make it seem more serious. He can't even lie competently. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
OK there are disagreements about the use of photoshop. Let's just say the pictures were very obviously staged.
And yes, of course we are all now paranoid. We are meant to be paranoid. That's the point of the White House's endless, repetitive, constant lying, it's designed to make us that way.
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"By dangling multibillion-dollar rare-earth and energy deals, Moscow could reshape the economic map of Europe—while driving a wedge between America and its traditional allies"
“A European intelligence agency distributed a hard-copy report in a manila envelope to the continent’s most senior security officials...inside were details of the commercial plans the US had been pursuing with Russia, including jointly mining rare earths in the Arctic.”
"A question for history will be whether Putin entertained this approach in the interest of ending the war, or as a ploy to pacify the U.S. while prolonging a conflict he believes is his place in history to slowly, ineluctably win"
Thanks to the Republican Congress, and a tsunami of lies from Musk and others, the only US agency dedicated to tracking and exposing Russian and Chinese propaganda around the world ceases to exist france24.com/en/live-news/2…france24.com/en/live-news/2…
Once again, more comprehensively: I wrote what I think about this election before it happened, will put it all together here.
My book Autocracy Inc, described the background, the network of autocrats who seek to undermine democracy, everywhere penguinrandomhouse.com/books/725302/a…
My podcast, Autocracy in America, described the ways in which American democracy was already weakening podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/aut…
Several years ago I wrote another book, Twilight of Democracy, about why people who live in democracies, including people I know, are attracted to the far-right penguinrandomhouse.com/books/621076/t…
Here's what I think. 1. We are living in an incredibly dangerous world. A network of autocracies is now working actively to undermine the democratic world. I wrote about this in my book, Autocracy Inc. Will we fight back? penguinrandomhouse.com/books/725302/a…
American democracy is already failing, in multiple ways. Autocratic tactics are already visible. @peterpomeranzev and I described some of them in our podcast, Autocracy in America. theatlantic.com/podcasts/autoc…
If you want to know more: Here is the ICC arrest warrant for Putin "for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation" icc-cpi.int/news/situation…